Those places aren’t isolated though. Many of their residents (and especially their children) have left and found opportunities in other parts of the country.

Economists tend to prefer policies that help people, not places. Gary, Indiana just doesn’t have any geographical advantages that make it competitive.

I think, if anything, the mistake was to allow people in those places to believe there would be an eventual turnaround by trying to prop up uncompetitive manufacturing industries.

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SoftTalker 2 days ago | parent | next [-]

Gary has a port on Lake Michigan, is right next to Chicago and its rail and transit hubs, is well-connected to the interstate highway system, has an airport... it's hard for me to understand how it doesn't have geographical advantages.

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nradov 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Gary has a huge geographical advantage in being located on the Great Lakes. This really cuts the cost of transport for bulk materials. And it gives them a reliable source of fresh water. It could be a great site for a nuclear power plant. Regardless of how AI economic policy shakes out, we're going to need a lot more electrical power.

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oblio 2 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Gary, Indiana.

Large parts of Northern England.

Large parts of Scotland.

Walloonia in Belgium.

Northern France.

There are LOTS of regions where the people living there have never recovered after deindustrialization. We cannot expect millions of people to just uproot, it's not realistic.

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nradov a day ago | parent | next [-]

Why is it not realistic? The USA is largely populated by millions of immigrants and the descendants of immigrants who just uprooted. My grandparents uprooted themselves from what's now Croatia in the 1930s and never returned. I'm sure it was tough for them but when times are hard you do what's necessary.

That said, there's a lot we could do to revitalize Gary if anyone in a position of power cared to try.

	▲	oblio a day ago \| parent [-]
		The US and the other new world countries were populated by kicking out the locals over centuries in a time when land and housing were cheap and demand for unqualified labor was huge. None of those conditions apply anymore.

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MattPalmer1086 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

This is true. Pretty much everyone I was friends with at school in the north of england left, most of us now in or around London. But we were the ones who went to university. Most who didn't stayed put.

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harimau777 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

What about the people who cannot leave?